The Heartland POD on TwitterGo to heartlandpod.com for information on all our political podcasts, and a link to support our work on Patreon. Sign up as an Official PODhead for just $5 per month to access all our premium podcast segments and political writing. To join the conversation on Twitter, find us at THE Heartland POD. Alright! Let’s get into it: COLORADO NEWSLINE: RINO hunters looking for a bloodbathAs county clerks across Colorado prepared to send out mail ballots to voters on Monday, former President Donald Trump weighed in on one of the state’s most-watched 2022 races.Trump blasted Republican U.S. Senate candidate Joe O’Dea, a Denver construction CEO, as a “RINO,” or Republican in name only, over comments O’Dea made about a potential 2024 Trump presidential campaign.In a Sunday appearance on CNN’s State of the Union, O’Dea was asked whether the Jan. 6 assault on the U.S. Capitol should disqualify Trump from running again. O’Dea called the events of Jan. 6 “a black eye for our country,” though he has previously said he doesn’t believe Trump deserves blame for the Capitol attack.“I don’t think Donald Trump should run again,” O’Dea said Sunday. “I’m going to actively campaign against Donald Trump and make sure that we’ve got four or five really great Republicans right now — Ron DeSantis, Nikki Haley, Tim Scott. They can run and serve for eight years.”Trump responded in a post on his Truth Social website: “MAGA doesn’t Vote for stupid people with big mouths”O’Dea faces an uphill battle against incumbent Sen. Michael Bennet, a Democrat who is seeking his third full Senate term, in a state that has trended increasingly blue in recent elections. Bennet has led O’Dea in recent polling by an average of eight percentage points, according to FiveThirtyEight.A first-time candidate who has pitched himself as a moderate on social issues, O’Dea has walked a tightrope throughout his campaign as he seeks to win over moderate voters without alienating the conservative Republican base.He did not publicly state his opposition to a Trump 2024 bid until after the June GOP primary, when he defeated far-right state Rep. Ron Hanks with 55% of the vote. His campaign clarified that O’Dea would still support Trump in the general election if the former president wins the GOP nomination, but O’Dea has since backed off of that position in interviews.GOP state Rep. Dave Williams, a far-right election denier who mounted an unsuccessful primary challenge against U.S. Rep. Doug Lamborn earlier this year, reacted to Trump’s comments in a Twitter post.“Ouch,” Williams wrote. “Maybe Joe’s campaign shouldn’t alienate the base 3 weeks before an election.”Trump’s criticism follows Ron Hanks’ endorsement of the Libertarian in the Senate race, Bryan Peotter, who has put election denial and total opposition to abortion at the center of his campaign. The Libertarian wrote on Twitter that Trump’s attack on O’Dea “reads like an endorsement for my campaign pretty clearly.”In an Oct. 7 appearance on the conservative “Chuck and Julie Show,” Ron Hanks, who received just under 45% of the vote in the GOP’s June primary, said neither Peotter nor O’Dea have a chance of beating Bennet - and that Republican voters should vote for Peotter to send a message to party leaders.“It’s our time now as grassroots Colorado conservatives to step in. We have a big battle ahead to try to reform this leadership,” said Hanks. “It’s got to be a bloodbath.”COLORADO NEWSLINE: Will Colorado legalize psychedelic mushrooms?Ten years after Colorado voters made history by approving the ballot measure that legalized recreational marijuana, this November’s Proposition 122 would allow licensed ‘healing centers’ and decriminalize personal use of some hallucinogens. The Natural Medicine Health Act would establish a regulated market for psilocybin and psilocyn, the psychoactive compounds found in psychedelic mushrooms. Placed on the 2022 ballot by a citizen initiative, it will become law if a majority